It is commonplace in the construction and renovation of commercial and residential buildings for the need to pass cables, conduits and the like through construction barriers such as walls, floors ceilings. However, the presence of an opening through such barriers raises a potential hazard in that a fire can use those opening to pass through the construction barrier, which of itself is an effective fire barrier, and the fire can then spread to adjoining areas of the building. As such, fire barriers are normally located with the openings that are designed to prevent the passage of fire through those openings.
One such apparatus for providing an effective firestop is shown and described in U.S. Pat. No. 6,732,481 issued May 1, 2004 to James P. Stahl, Sr. and the disclosure of that patent is hereby incorporated herein in its entirety by reference.
In the aforedescribed patent, there is a firestop that includes two intumescent pads that are generally located opposite to each other so as to form a confinement area therebetween through which the penetrating members can extend in passing through the construction barrier. In the event of a fire, the intumescent pads react to the heat to tightly seal against the penetrating member so as to close any path for the fire to pass through the construction barrier to other areas of the building.
While the fire barrier of the aforesaid patent is perfectly acceptable, it can be improved by having some flexibility in the spacing between the intumescent pads so as to accommodate large and small volumes of penetrating members with the same effectiveness in sealing the opening in the event of a fire i.e. so that both large volumes and cross sections of penetrating members can be equally sealed against as smaller volumes of such members.
Accordingly, it would be advantageous to have a fire stop apparatus of the type described in the aforedescribed U.S. Patent but additionally have more flexibility and versatility in the formation and adjustment of the size of the confinement area between the intumescent pads so as to be able to effectively seal the opening where a large volume of penetrating members are concerned as well as a smaller volume of penetrating members.
In addition, there is a further problem in the installation of the subject barriers in that currently where a plurality of such barriers are installed together, such as the sleeves of the Stahl, Sr. '481 patent, the installation is difficult since the sleeves are normally simply squeezed together and held therein by a wall flange or frame and, in practice, the adjacent sleeves are difficult to handle and can slip out of alignment. The problem is exacerbated when the installation of the plurality of sleeves is through a floor where gravity is basically working against the installation of the ganged sleeves. It would, therefore, be advantageous to have a securing system or mechanism that enables the installer to align and secure adjacent sleeves together to facilitate their installation in a construction barrier.